Shit ! Daniel cursed within him , that drink the pirates drank tasted like horse piss than spirit . Give him a good brandy any day over that wretched brew. Gazing about, he wondered why he had bothered to get up , he had nowhere to go.
"Blah" , he said to the room at large , not even knowing why he did it, he swung his self out of bed and picked up his shirt from the wood floor where he had left it the night before.
Habit, probably, he was used to waking early and being active all day . Donning the rumpled linen quickly, he went to the door.
He knew it would be locked, but could not resist trying it anyhow.
The handle turned easily under his hand, opening with nary a sound. What was this? Daniel searched his foggy memory , but he was sure the door had been locked yesterday.
This was tantamount to an invitation. he's never the type to refuse an invitation, he cautiously stepped out into the corridor.
Retracing his steps, Daniel found his way to the front of the house .No one was insight, it seemed, and he heard no voice calling for him to stop.
He reached the front room decorated with thick , jewel-toned carpets and blue brocaded settees. A couple of quite decent landscape paintings, removed from some captured ships no doubts, hung from the cream-and- gold gold fabric-covered walls. Curtains of the same dark blue as the couches fluttered in the open windows. it was then that he noticed the half-open door to the verandah.
Curious, for he heard the sound of cutlery being rattled outside, he made his way to the doorway . Hesitating just this side of it, he saw a table set up on the sun-drenched porch and the woman his dreams could not shake seated at it.
Daniel must have made some sounds, for she looked up at that moment.
Daniel caught his breath in his throat. He would have to stop reacting in this adolescent manner every time he was faced with thi pirate queen or would surely suffocate, he thought with a scowl.
But faced with the pirate's autumn-hued hair shining that way in it's coronet and her golden skin glowing so brightly with health, not to mention her beautiful body so slightly clad, controlling his breath was a task Hercules would have shied from.
This morning, the shirt Captain Thorne wore was of fine white lawn, almost sheer. A black leather vest , loosely laced at the sides, went over it and saved it from total immodesty.
He had noticed that, though her manner of dress was enough to catch any man's eye with it's very unusualness, she never left her shirt open to far , nor did she flaunt her body in any way.
All of her sensuality was unconscious. He wondered what she would look like if she tried to be seductive, perhaps if she donned skirts like other women, and he decided he liked her appearance well enough in it's natural state.
Artifice would not suit a woman like Captain Thorne.